Suggestions for parliamentary reforms in 2015

Kenyans of all political persuasions will agree that the National Assembly finished 2014 at a low point unbefitting of an institution of its stature. Related events in the Senate served to amplify the sense that Parliament, as an institution, has lost its way and become a mere rubber stamp institution that takes its orders from elsewhere.

As a student of the Kenyan Parliament, I am of the view that the current problems experienced by ‘Bunge’ are a result of the confusing institutional structures created by the 2010 Constitution. As it is, Parliament is a hybrid of the American and British legislatures. Its legacy is singularly British, but with American adaptations. For instance, we have a rich parliamentary tradition of neutrality of the Speaker. This has been true from Humphrey Slade to the Solomonic Kenneth Marende. Even under Moi, speakers of the House did their best to make sure they projected a sense of neutrality.

But the new Constitution created a bicameral system very much in the American mold. Cabinet no longer sits in Parliament. We have strict separation of powers, with considerable budgetary powers for the National Assembly. We also have speakerships that have been set up for partisanship.

It is, therefore, not surprising that the speakers of both Houses have, so far, been unreformed partisans, ready to do their party’s bidding even at the expense of the institutional independence of Parliament.

Now, partisanship in the office of the Speaker, in and of itself, is not necessarily a bad thing. The American speaker of the House of Representatives is as partisan as they come. Yet Congress remains a fairly independent and robust institution. The trick is in making partisanship work for the institution of Parliament, and the wider public. This can only be achieved if Parliament sets rules that not only guide its day-to-day operations, but also constrain the speaker, and disperse power to the heads of committees and other officeholders in the House.

So the advice to CORD, and the Opposition, is that instead of suing for Speaker neutrality, what they should push for is greater harmonisation of the Standing Orders with the new reality of hyper-partisanship. If they want to give the National Assembly teeth, they need to push for a revision of the rules of the game to grant Parliament greater levels of internal differentiation – through well-defined roles for Parliamentary Committees and sub-committees - that will allow the Opposition to play a more robust role.

The cat of Speaker neutrality is out of the bag, and unlikely to be put back in. It is time to think of other ways to actualise the idea of a loyal Opposition in Parliament.

One way to do this would be to give specific Committee members, and especially the heads of committees, security of tenure as long as they get reelected. This way, leadership in the House would be based on seniority in service, as opposed to the whims of party honchos outside of Parliament. Security of tenure and specific and well-defined powers for committee heads would also serve to disperse power in the House, and constrain the Speaker. As things stand, Speaker Justin Muturi is a tyrant ruling over largely hapless members of the House. He allegedly gets his orders from State House, and the junior staff at the State Law Office. He is largely unaccountable to elected Members of Parliament.

Therefore, even members of the Jubilee Administration ought to have an incentive to clip the powers of the Speaker and disperse power within the House. The challenge for CORD politicians is to figure out how to build a coalition that will make such revisions to the Standing Orders a possibility.

The more Parliament moves closer to the American model, the more such revisions will become necessary if we are to maintain a reasonably well functioning Parliament.

The quest to save Parliament from ignominy should be more than a mere CORD affair. It should include all MPs who care about the institution in which they serve, and the public good. Hopefully in the new year our MPs will realise the immense powers they have under the Constitution and actually begin to exercise them. It is unfortunate that over the last year all we have seen are members too lazy to do their homework on legislative activity, and quick to take kickbacks from vested interests in order to massage committee reports and short-circuit the representative function of Parliament.

As a country, we are unlucky that at a time when we needed Slade, Kaparo, and Marende rolled into one, all we got was Justin Muturi.